Experience Planner

My inbox was all a buzz today about the new Cuil search engine that launched, masterminded by ex-Google engineers, that, according to reports, boasts a search index that’s three times higher than Google’s. So I spent a little time checking it out.

You can tell right away Cuil looks much prettier than Google. But when you look past the pretty dressing, what do you get?

I was underwhelmed as I looked more closely at my search results. While I see the potential, the design does not lead your eye around the page to understand the hierarchy of the search results. And I missed Google’s “Did you mean … ” feature when I misspelled common search terms on Cuil. And there isn’t an “Advanced Search” feature to be found.

And while Cuil is promoting the quanity of pages they index, they are falling below Google on quality. The search results for some of the brand names I searched on appeared to be relevant, but as I went on to search lesser known terms, I got irrelevant results.

I do really like Cuil’s Explore by Category section to suggest related searches, and the tabs at the top do help narrow your search. These are great features that are easy to use.

As Google said themselves, it’s great to see more competition come into the search space. And I do like that Cuil is more concerned about user privacy. I’m looking forward to the competition pushing the industry to keep getting better.

As professionals in the digital industry, we’ve been on high-speed Internet connections for quite a while, at both home and work. So I found value in a recent CNN article that reminded me there still is significant opportunity for growth. According to a recent Pew Internet and American Life Project, 55% of Americans have broadband, and 10% have dialup at home. The 35% of Americans who still don’t have access to the internet from home are primarily those with lower incomes and the elderly. 

Since it’s my job to create the best digitial experiences for users who are already online, unfortunately I’ll need to figure out how I can help those who don’t have internet access another day. My immediate concern is ensuring we design and develop sites that those still on dial-up can use.

Small Percentage, Mighty Number

A colleague of mine made a valuable point that when you only look at the people online, 95.7% have broadband and only 4.3% have dial-up, according to a recent MAGNA Global study. But that 4.3% on dial-up still represents 3.2 million Americans. The MAGNA study forecasts that the number on dial-up will continue to fall during the next few years, but according to the Pew study that won’t happen until prices for broadband become more reasonable for lower-income Americans.

In the meantime, 3.2 million Americans is a small percentage, but a mighty number. Let’s not forget about them as we plan our digital experiences. While sites can be optimized for high-speed connections, dial-up users should still be able to access key pages and functionality without the page hanging up or taking an unreasonable amount of time to deliver. What if it’s a checkout page for an e-commerce site? That’s too many customers to ignore. Plus an increasing percentage of users are accessing the same sites from their mobile phones, with even slower connections.

Your Site’s Dial-up Percentage

Of course, your site analytics are the tell-tale factor to determine how many of your site users have broadband vs. dial-up. A site like Wired.com probably won’t optimize for dial-up users as Knitting World would.

And that’s just the U.S. As another colleague of mine pointed out, if your site has global reach, it’s important to look at the broadband vs. dial-up adoption rate in your target countries. Chances are that will bring your broadband percentage down too.

Championing All Connections

I look forward to the day when everyone is on broadband connections from their homes, and I can access the internet while I’m on a plane or riding in a car. And the day when page load times aren’t much of a factor. But until then, I want to be a champion for all users, big connection or small.

Time and again I’ve been in usability testing and focus groups, with very different types of users, and they’ve all asked for the same thing — get rid of the marketing “fluff” and make the approach real.

I’ve seen attorneys, baby boomers, moms and Millennials, with different incomes and interests, all ask for the same thing–images they can relate to and text that tells it to them straight. In fact, I was recently in usability testing where the headline “Looking for Straight Talk” ended up drawing a lot of eyes, even though it was in a low place of prominence on the page, because yes, in fact, they were looking for straight talk.

So how can we make things real? There are a few common elements.

Give More than Pretty Pictures

People like to see themselves in images on a site, which can often be a challenge. That’s why one person in an image usually doesn’t work, because it limits the site’s ability to reach to a diverse audience. Most designers have mastered representing diversity so well that consumers have come to expect this.

But the other part of helping people see themselves is by keeping the models in the picture doing something the user can relate to. Usually this isn’t perfectly posed and smiling models, or a far reaching fantasy of how they’re using the company’s product or service. For example, if a company is selling a beach vacation, a perfect couple smiling for the camera and walking along a private beach doesn’t seem as real as a couple snorkeling with a small group–wearing goggles, big fins and all.

No ‘Marketese’

When marketing a product or service, marketers naturally want to spin the text to make it sound great. But this often means diluting the meaning and leaving the user with nothing but “fluff”. Rather than hearing how great a product or service is, users value how it works and why it works much more.  They’re rather figure out if it’s great themselves.

Here is a comparison with text from two music sites:

From the “About Us” page on MyPlay: “When you shop at store.MyPlay.com, you will not only find your favorite SONY BMG artists and titles but you’ll also have access to special offers such as autographed merchandise from your favorite artists, limited edition gifts with purchase, electronics, video, books and much more. Whether you’re searching for the latest releases, trying to track down an old favorite song, or looking to discover something new, you’ll find the largest collection of SONY BMG titles online right here at store.MyPlay.com.”

From the first page on iTunes: “Shop for music, movies, TV shows, audiobooks, podcasts, and games. For Mac + PC.”

Not only does the MyPlay example contain a lot of fluff while the iTunes example gets straight to the point, iTunes also does a much better job of informing users what the site is from the first page of their site, while MyPlay doesn’t even mention what the site is until you dig deeper by finding the “About Us” link in the footer on the site.

Converse with Users

When a customer calls customer service, hopefully he will get a live person (eventually), voice his concern, and get resolution to his problem. But the new customer complaint is often posting a blog, a message board, or a video for all to see.

No matter if the content is posted on the company’s Web site or on a neutral third party site, the worst things a company can do is not be aware of the post, ignore it, or try to discredit it. The best thing is to address it with a straightforward response. Even if it is “Thank you for alerting Company Y to this problem. We’re going to work toward improving this.” can turn a critic into an advocate when the company does improve it.

Another way that companies can discredit themselves is by dismissing public criticism, and not addressing the issues head on. For example, after the recent media scare about BHA in plastic products for babies, I visited several sites. The best treatment was from companies that put a link on their home page, with FAQs and straight information on their sites. The worst treatment was from a company that didn’t address the issue on their site, and when contacted dismissed it because the FDA approves of BHA in plastics.

I’d like to know more, what are other ways marketers can be real for their customers?